Windows xp wallpapers wiki

From Windows Wallpaper Wiki

For pre-release wallpapers and pictures, see Whistler.

Windows XP, codenamed Whistler, is an operating system released by Microsoft in 2001. It is the successor to Windows 2000 and Me, being the first version of Windows NT intended for both businesses and home users. It includes a set of wallpapers, and for the first time, multiple sample pictures and user account pictures too. Its default wallpaper is Bliss, which has become one of the world’s most viewed photos as a result of XP’s success, and is also the first time Windows having a picture as the default desktop wallpaper. Other notable wallpapers include Red moon desert, taken by Bliss’ photographer Charles O’Rear, Autumn, which was the subject of a 2007 Vanity Fair article and the branding wallpaper.

Windows XP was succeeded by Windows Vista in 2006, after years of being in development.

Wallpapers

Rob Girling served as the design manager of Windows XP. His team carried out user research, which found that there was a common preference for landscape wallpapers. Jen Shetterly was the product design lead of XP, and was involved with curating and naming the wallpapers; she advocated for Microsoft to use Bliss as the default wallpaper, as an evolution to Windows 95’s clouds branding motif. Incidentally, it also fits the color scheme of the default Luna visual style. While many of these wallpapers are nature-oriented, she has stated that this was not an intentional theme.^[1] According to Girling, he also also planned for the Professional edition to use a photo of an office building as the default wallpaper, but this idea was rejected by higher ups, likely because Microsoft extensively used Bliss to market XP.^[2]

The photographic wallpapers were licensed from Corbis and used a mix of royalty free and rights managed licenses, while Bliss was bought out from Corbis and Charles O’Rear, transferring the intellectual property to Microsoft, and as a result it can no longer be licensed by any companies for usage. With the exception of Vortec space, the non-photographic wallpapers were created by two designers, including Microsoft designer Greg Melander and a short-term contracted designer, while the branding wallpaper is based on a Windows flag render by XP’s creative director Horace Luke.^[2]

Like with Windows 2000, the wallpapers are at a rather low resolution of 800×600, lower than most displays common during this period. Downloadable wallpapers would later be released, often provided in higher resolutions, while XP’s successor Windows Vista features wallpapers in 1920×1440 and 1920×1200. XP also includes tile wallpapers in BMP format. These were reused from Windows 2000, which were in turn reused from Windows NT 4.0, so they are not listed here.

Media Center Edition-exclusive

As Media Center Edition came with many features of Microsoft Plus! for Windows XP, its wallpapers were also included alongside the standard set, albeit with new names that reference what is depicted in the wallpaper. Most of these wallpapers appear to have been taken from Getty Images, although some were presumably taken down many years ago, leaving their origins unclear. Unlike with most of XP’s wallpapers, these appear to have went under noticeable edits from the original images, such as altered saturation and brightness.

Starter Edition

Starter Edition was only released in developing countries such as Latin American countries, Russia and various Asian and African countries. Each localized version of Starter Edition has around three to six wallpapers depicting national landmarks, and does not include the standard wallpaper set found in other versions of Windows XP. Most of these were licensed from Corbis and Getty Images and use a rights managed license, with a few being royalty free.

Similar to the Home and Professional editions of Windows XP, these wallpapers have a resolution of 800×600 (with the exception of one being 801×600, likely by accident). Unlike these two editions, however, Windows XP Starter Edition includes wallpapers in the Bitmap (.bmp) file format instead of the JPEG (.jpg) file format. The practice of having regional wallpapers would be used again by Microsoft for Windows 7, where 20 countries received two themes (built-in and downloadable) consisting of six wallpapers each.

The default wallpaper is SE_neutral_wallpaper, which is completely unrelated to the default wallpaper used in most other editions. Also, due to the rarity of Windows XP Starter Edition in several countries, not all wallpapers are available or even known so they cannot be listed here.

Windows Embedded Standard and POSReady 2009

In late 2008, Microsoft released Windows Embedded Standard and Embedded POSReady 2009, both versions are based on Windows XP Service Pack 3. Both versions feature three wallpapers: one with no logo, one with a small logo and one with a large logo.

• Background without logo.

• Windows Embedded POSReady 2009 background with large logo.

• Windows Embedded POSReady 2009 background with small logo.

Sample pictures

Windows XP features a selection of four sample pictures. All four of these are royalty free Corbis images, three of which were available from royalty free CDs, with the other one seemingly being online only. Like with the wallpapers, all of these images have a resolution of 800×600.

Media Center Edition-exclusive

Windows XP Media Center Edition adds five new sample pictures to accompany the standard selection, which are also royalty free Corbis images. These retain the aspect ratios of the original images (usually around 3:2); similarly, a few Windows 7 Beta pictures do this as well. Rather than using 800×600 like the original four sample pictures, they appear at various 3:2-ish resolutions, all 1280px wide.

User account pictures

Windows XP is the first released version of Windows to include selectable user account pictures in 48×48 to represent the user, although the cancelled version Neptune also features a selection of pictures. According to Rob Girling, no user research was carried out unlike with the wallpapers; the team attempted to pick a selection of «globally minded» images by avoiding any political or racial ideas, but in hindsight he feels they only half-succeeded with this.^[2]

A mix of royalty free Corbis images and PhotoDisc images, including a few rights managed Corbis images comprise the Windows XP user account picture choices. A few of them appear to have edited background colors from the original images, possibly to create more contrast between the background and object. Many of these also appear in several versions of Windows Live Messenger, albeit at a slightly higher resolution of 96×96.

References

External links

• Windows XP HD Wallpaper Pack

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Windows XP visual styles are a set of visual customizations of the graphical user interface for Windows XP. They are designed by Microsoft and are compatible with all Windows XP editions except for the Starter edition. Since Windows XP, themes also includes the choice of visual styles as well.^[1]

Compared to Desktop Themes in Microsoft Plus! for Windows 95, Windows 98, and Windows Me, the new visual styles of Windows XP have a greater emphasis on the graphical appeal of the operating system, using saturated colors^[2] and bitmaps^[3] throughout the interface, with rounded corners for windows.^[4][5]

By default, «Luna» is preinstalled on Windows XP Home Edition and Professional, while «Royale» is preinstalled on Windows XP Media Center Edition 2005 and «Embedded» is preinstalled on Windows Embedded Standard 2009 and Windows Embedded POSReady 2009. In addition to the preinstalled visual styles, Microsoft has released additional ones for download, such as «Zune». Third parties have also released their own visual styles, however these require modification of core Windows components to work, a practice that Microsoft does not officially endorse. «Luna», «Royale», «Zune», and «Embedded» in particular are codenames of the official visual styles made by Microsoft for Windows XP.^[6]

There are also some visual styles that were developed by Microsoft as placeholders before unveiling the official visual styles, and are usually used in beta versions of Windows. These include visual styles such as «Watercolor», «Mallard», «Plex», «Slate» and «Jade». «Watercolor» and «Mallard» are included by default in pre-release Windows XP builds prior to the release of Beta 2, while «Plex», «Slate» and «Jade» are included with various builds of Windows Longhorn (the predecessor to Windows Vista during its development) prior to its development reset in 2004.

The visual styles API was substantially expanded in Windows Vista and later. Nevertheless, the API remained heavily under-documented.^[7]

«Luna» (the Moon in Latin and various other languages) is the codename for the default visual style of Windows XP. Officially known as «Windows XP style», it is available in three color schemes: blue (default), olive green, and silver.^[5][8] Critics who did not like the theme characterized it as a «Fisher-Price interface» among other names, due to its perceived childish nature and design.^[9][10]

Luna was also present as a placeholder theme in all pre-reset Windows Vista (Longhorn) builds alongside the Plex, Slate and Jade themes, as well as the very early «Omega-13» post-reset builds 3790, 5000, 5001, and early Beta 1 builds 5048 and 5059. It was absent from all post-reset builds starting with build 5098 after the unveiling of Aero in build 5048.

«Luna Beta» is an informal name given to a near-final version of the Luna theme that was used in beta builds of Windows XP from builds 2428 to 2465, replacing the Watercolor and Mallard themes found in previous builds prior to build 2428. An even earlier version of Luna Beta was showcased at CES 2001 using an internal build of Windows XP that was developed for the event. The source files as well as the theme file for this iteration of Luna later appeared in the leaked source code of Windows XP in September 2020. Officially known as «Whistler style», it is similar to the final Luna theme with some slight differences, such as a brighter scrollbar, differently-shaped taskbar buttons, and a much shinier start button. It also lacks the two color options, namely olive green (codenamed «Homestead») and silver (codenamed «Metallic»). This theme is unofficially available as a separate theme made by enthusiasts.^{[citation needed]}

Windows Classic is a visual style that is built-in to the operating system, utilizing the classic Windows look-and-feel that was used in previous versions of Windows prior to Windows XP. Officially titled «Windows Classic style», it is less CPU-intensive and offers better performance^[11] (which is also the reason why it is used by default on Windows Server 2003 through 2008 R2). It is used when the theme service is disabled, as well as in other certain scenarios such as Win32 console windows or when booting the system into Safe mode. Classic style widgets are also used for applications that are not theming-aware even though theming is enabled.

Compared to other visual styles, it supports greater color and font customization options. Windows XP and prior includes 22 preset color schemes for the classic style, with four of them^[12] being optimized for the visually impaired. «Windows Standard» was the default color scheme of Windows 2000 and Windows Me and later appeared on Windows Vista and Windows 7 (which was renamed to «Windows Classic» in the latter). A slightly darker variant of the Standard scheme, called «Windows Classic» (not to be confused with the renamed «Windows Classic» variant of «Windows Standard» in Windows 7), was the default color scheme of Windows 98 (albeit with a dark blue desktop background instead of green, which was a change that was done with Windows 2000 during its development) and appeared on Windows Vista but not Windows 7.^[13][5] Other schemes appeared in previous versions of Windows.

The style was removed as an option from Windows Server 2012 and Windows 8 onwards; however it still exists internally for backward compatibility purposes.^{[citation needed]}

Royale (also known as Energy Blue and Media Center style) was a visual style designed for Windows XP Media Center Edition 2005 and later ported over to Windows XP Tablet PC Edition 2005.^[14] It is accompanied by a new wallpaper (inspired by Windows XP’s iconic Bliss wallpaper). It presents a relucent, vivid, and faux-reflective color scheme with intense blue and green colors. The theme was later made available in December 2004 as an optional download.

On April 7, 2005, Microsoft New Zealand^[15] had made the Royale theme and the wallpapers for the New Zealand theme available for download^[16] for all editions of XP through Windows Genuine Advantage on its website, but as of 2019 it is no longer available. Because of the freeware nature of this package, it had also been available on software download websites, such as Softpedia at one time.^[17] The wallpaper included with the package is different from the one that was included with Windows XP Media Center Edition 2005 and Windows XP Tablet PC Edition 2005.

Microsoft did also release a Windows Media Player visualization and skin at one time^[when?]. The skin was released in Experience Pack for Tablet PC and was available for free,^[18] but the installer only installed it on Windows XP Tablet PC Edition devices, for which it was licensed.

Royale Noir looks like a darkened version of Royale, having a blackish and bluish to purple tint. Royale Noir has a black Start button, which changes to green when the mouse hovers over it. As Royale Noir was leaked and not finalized by Microsoft, it has been noted for some imperfections,^[19] such as the title bar becoming too dark when the window is inactive.

A few weeks after Royale Noir was leaked, Zune was officially released in a theme package to accompany the release of Microsoft’s new Zune media player. In terms of style, Zune resembles Royale and Royale Noir, particularly the latter. It displays a brown to light shadow style and is the first publicly released visual style for Windows XP to include a differently colored Start button from the green XP,^[20][21] which is colored orange in the Zune theme.

Windows Embedded Standard 2009 and Windows Embedded POSReady 2009 came with a dedicated visual style called Embedded. It is similar to Royale, Royale Noir and Zune, featuring a mix of dark blue colors.

Watercolor (internally named «Business» and codenamed «Professional») is a placeholder theme that appeared in early pre-release builds of Windows XP from builds 2250 to 2419, and later appeared in the leaked source code of Windows XP in September 2020. Officially known as «Watercolor button style», the theme more closely resembles Windows Classic, featuring sharp edges and similar window proportions. It features a primarily blue and white style with mostly flat shading and retains certain UI elements from the Classic theme style. This theme is unofficially available as a separate theme made by enthusiasts.^{[citation needed]}

Mallard is an internal name of a placeholder theme that was designed as a decoy to show to the public during the development of Beta 2 while designers privately worked on Luna.^[22] It appeared in pre-release Windows XP builds from builds 2410 to 2419, and later appeared in the leaked source code of Windows XP in September 2020. Officially known as «Sample Test Visual Style», It features two color schemes, Chartreuse Mongoose, which features a primarily green and orange style, and Blue Lagoon (internally named as Paler), which uses a teal and purple style, though both themes feature an orange start button with a green notification area as well as a slight curve on the left-hand side of the title bar. This theme is unofficially available as a separate theme made by enthusiasts.

Candy is an unannounced and unreleased theme that was found in the leaked source code of Windows XP in September 2020. According to the date found within the metadata of the files in the theme, it was made in-between builds 2250 and 2257. Candy seems to be an imitation of the Aqua theme found in earlier versions of Mac OS X (10.0 to 10.6).^[23] Not much is known about its purpose, however it was likely meant as a way to test the theming engine that was first available in build 2250. According to some publicly available screenshots, only some UI elements, such as buttons, scroll bars, and the Start menu, had been redesigned to look like Mac OS X’s Aqua theme style; others still used the Classic theme style. The theme also contains a unique start button image that contains the Windows logo without the word «start» next to it while also featuring a small curved corner at the top-left, apparently mimicking that of the Apple menu which had a singular Apple logo, while the curved corners are a nod to Classic Mac OS’s menu bar which had curved corners on both sides.

Windows only loads a visual style that bears a valid Microsoft digital certificate.^[24] As such, third-party visual styles can only be used if one of the Windows files called uxtheme.dll is altered to allow unsigned visual styles.^[25][26] Microsoft is aware of such a practice and suggests obtaining a newer revision of the patched uxtheme.dll file in case problems occur after Microsoft’s own updates to the file have been applied (typically through an OS service pack).^[27]

Third-party applications can be configured to work with visual styles. By default, the title bar and the window borders of Windows Forms-based applications are rendered using the user’s preferred visual style, while the rest of the application’s graphical user interface (GUI) is rendered in the Classic style.^[28] This is because these two different parts of the GUI are rendered using two different software libraries: the title bar and the window borders («non-client area» or «user controls») use Windows USER, and the remaining controls («client area» or «common controls») use version 5.8 of the Common Controls Library.^[29] Version 6.0 of the Common Controls Library contains both the user controls and the common controls, and developers may configure the application’s user interface to be displayed in the user’s currently-selected visual style by forcing it to be rendered using version 6.0 of the library.^[30][31]

• Windows Aero
• WinCustomize
• WindowBlinds
• StyleXP
• Features new to Windows XP
• Theme (computing)

This is a pack of many
Windows XP wallpapers in 1920×1200 (with a few 3840×2160 versions),
rather than 800×600! Alongside the XP wallpapers, this pack also
includes wallpapers from Windows 2000, Mobile 5.x/6.x, MSN/Windows Live
Messenger, Plus! 98 and other stock photos that were taken by Windows
photographers. It doesn’t have everything, but it still has quite a lot
considering their rarity. There is also a version of the pack with some
of these wallpapers in vertical resolutions, which can be downloaded at:
drive.google.com/open?id=1oDuG….

If you aren’t
aware, Microsoft licensed most of their wallpapers from stock photo
sites such as Corbis and Getty Images. I have used a certain downloader
tool to retrieve many of these at higher resolutions, and in some cases I
even got some directly from old royalty free stock photo CDs. As stock
photo sites sometimes take photos down, not all of them are present in
this pack but I have been trying my best to find them. Also, if you’re
going to submit any of your finds to this pack, please be aware that I
do not accept upscaled wallpapers, as they do not preserve/add details
and I feel they have less value than the original images. You can always
try contacting the original photographers for full res versions,
although be prepared to spend a bit of money.

Included from XP are:

— Ascent, Azul, Bliss, Friend, Follow, Radiance, Red moon desert, Stonehenge, Tulips, Vortec space, Wind (11/20)

— airplane, astronaut, ball, beach, car, cat, dog, drip, duck, guest, guitar, kick (user account pictures) (12/24)

— Blue hills, Sunset, Water lilies, Winter (sample pictures) (4/4)

— Plus!/MCE wallpapers, sample pictures and Party Mode backgrounds

— Several Starter Edition wallpapers

— Fun Pack backgrounds

Included from 2000 are:

— Boiling Point, Gold Petals, Paradise, Snow Trees, Solar Eclipse (5/12)

If
you are unsure about anything, read the notes in each folder. These
clarify reasons why wallpapers may either look different from expected
or why some may be missing. 

Further links:

The original files of some Windows wallpapers: https://archive.org/details/theoriginalfilesofsomewindowswallpapers

Windows Wallpaper Wiki: https://windowswallpaper.miraheze.org/wiki/Main_Page